M5-branes from gauge theories on the 5-sphere
arXiv:1206.6339 · doi:10.1007/JHEP05(2013)144
Abstract
We use the 5-sphere partition functions of supersymmetric Yang-Mills theories to explore the (2,0) superconformal theory on S^5 x S^1. The 5d theories can be regarded as Scherk-Schwarz reductions of the 6d theory along the circle. In a special limit, the perturbative partition function takes the form of the Chern-Simons partition function on S^3. With a simple non-perturbative completion, it becomes a 6d index which captures the degeneracy of a sector of BPS states as well as the index version of the vacuum Casimir energy. The Casimir energy exhibits the N^3 scaling at large N. The large N index for U(N) gauge group also completely agrees with the supergravity index on AdS_7 x S^4.
44 pages, 1 figure, v4: ref added, clarified weak/strong coupling behaviors of large N free energy, minor improvements, version to be published in JHEP